Project description
Sustainable collaboration of African & European DIHs to boost digital innovation
Digital technologies are forever changing the way goods and services are designed, produced and commercialised. To support businesses in this digital transformation, the EU is investing in digital innovation hubs (DIHs) at home and abroad. The EU-funded HUBiquitous project will create a joint Africa-Europe Startup & Innovation Ecosystem for long-term collaborations and partnerships. Specifically, it will empower the startup and entrepreneurship ecosystems and increase the technology level and capacity building of 30 local DIHs/TechHubs in five African countries. Backed by a consortium of five European and four African partners from eight countries, the project will build on the existing cooperation and partnership stemming from two previous Horizon 2020 ICT International Collaborations with Africa projects (WAZIUP, WAZIHUB).
Objective
HUBiquitous is an Innovation Action aiming at creating a joint Africa-Europe Startup & Innovation Ecosystem for long-term collaborations and partnerships. The project has the ambition to increase the technology level and capacity building of 30 local DIHs/TechHubs in 5 African countries. The project proposes highly innovative concepts called Innovation Enablers (i.e. Solution Lab, Application Business Box, and MeetHub online platform). The purpose of these enablers is to provide technical (e.g. IoT, AI, and BigData disruptive technologies) as well as entrepreneurial development skills to DIHs and startups/entrepreneurs. Thanks to these Innovation Enablers, the project will further demonstrate and build the local innovation and ecosystem capacity through 3 programs: (i) Talent program, building digital skills for local talents, (ii) Accelerator program, creating innovative applications and products and (iii) Community program, developing the Africa-Europe start-up and innovation communities. HUBiquitous Innovation Enablers and Programs will, therefore, support and empower the startup and entrepreneurship ecosystems from both continents with the development of a rich and sustainable collaboration between African and European DIHs. HUBiquitous consortium is composed of a partnership of Ten (10) entities, five European and five African, coming from nine different countries. It builds on the existing cooperation and partnership stemming from two previous H2020 ICT International Collaborations with Africa projects (WAZIUP and WAZIHUB). The ultimate target of HUBiquitous is to pave the way for long-term and sustainable innovation for the African DIHs.
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IA - Innovation actionCoordinator
04129 Leipzig
Germany
The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.